Interview: Lindsay Lohan

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The teen sensation and star of Herbie talks to IGN.

By Jeff Otto

When I first met Lindsay Lohan for one of my first IGN FilmForce assignments two years ago for Freaky Friday, Lohan was still a slightly shy teen. Preparing for my interview, I had to ask my girlfriend's 12 year-old niece for some background info on the young star. At that point, she appealed to a demographic about 15 years younger then me and possessing a different set of chromosomes.

My second interview with Lohan was just over a year ago for Mean Girls. On the verge of turning 18, Mean Girls' buzz was building at the time, but no one could have guessed the crossover appeal the role would have and the impact on Lohan's career that would follow. Mean Girls was a success, Lohan turned 18 and suddenly the actress was on the cover of every Entertainment magazine around. Unfortunately for her, she was also soon gracing the covers of supermarket rags, linked to the party-gal antics of the likes of Paris Hilton.

Now, in 2005, I headed out to interview Lohan for a third time. This one was to be her third Disney remake, Herbie: Fully Loaded, and according to some reports, likely her last. This time, instead of the quiet hotel room interviews I'd had with the actress in the past, Lohan entered a room full of shouting and highly obnoxious press, each one eager to probe the young actress and hopefully get their hands on a little dirt. The price of fame, I suppose.

The first question was about Lohan's recent MTV award for Mean Girls and how she celebrated the victory. "I threw a little gathering of about a hundred people. It was very small but really cool. Chris Rock was there and Quentin Tarantino, most of the people from [Herbie]. It was really cool. It was fun and it was controlled. It was relaxing and I kind of lost my voice a little bit. I was the host of the party and that was a bit stressful. I was running around all night trying to make people feel comfortable."

Lohan ready to race

Herbie marks her third theatrical feature for Disney, as well as a few features for the Disney channel. "Disney gave me my opportunity to, you know, follow what I wanted to do in life. I owe a lot to them and they've been really good to me. So coming in to do another remake, you could say I felt safe with them. But its always nerve-racking because you don't know what the people from the generation that saw the movie originally are going to say about the films. You want to live up to their expectations, so they'll like the new one. And I trust Disney because they keep the elements from the original and they update it how it turns out now, which is great. They keep it young and fresh and they make it appealing to all ages."

To play a race car driver in the film, Lohan got to do some real-life racing to train for the part. "I had fun doing that. When I first went to the Richard Petty Experience for the driving school, Angela the director got on the track and I was supposed to drive too, but I was too scared. I wanted to faster, but I didn't want to have to drive going faster. And I got in the car with the guy, and we were going so fast. I think a hundred and ninety or a hundred and ninety five miles an hour. And you get so close to the wall. I started screaming and almost started crying. I though I was going to die. But when I learned stick and started to drive, I got use to it. I had to learn the skill for all the maneuvers, which would have been helpful the other day." (Laughs)

On the Herbie set

When asked about co-stars Michael Keaton and Matt Dillion, Lohan burst into the 60's Batman theme. "Matt's incredible. He's so amazing to watch because he gets so intense and into, sometimes I would make fun of him actually. Michael was great because he was very parental towards me and it was really nice. You know, I needed it at the time, and he still is, so I learned a lot from them and I'd love to work with them again."

After Mean Girls, the magazine covers and the overall media blitz surrounding her during the second half of 2004, Lohan says that her life hasn't actually changed that much. "I think that people might assume that [my life is] different because of what they read in the tabloids, but for me its been a really great learning experience, this whole last year. I feel like I've grown a lot as a person and just in terms of my acting; the roles that I want to choose now. So I'm aware of what to do and what not to do. Last year was my year. That's when they started saying things, but that's the year I would have been going to college. It was kind of like my first year. I experienced going out all the time and hanging out with new people. I had never really gone to clubs and learning about it through that year. Then I kind of got over that really fast, but they continued to say that I still do it. So there's nothing really I can do at this point. I just don't want people to think that I'm not focused and that I'm not in this for the right reasons. I don't want to be misunderstood about that."